R2bn GSSC tender questioned

By Christelle du Toit, ITWeb senior journalist

Johannesburg, 10 Mar 2008

A R2 billion GautengOnline education project is shrouded in controversy, amid speculation of irregularities during the evaluation and awarding of the tender.

A source close to the process, who asked to remain anonymous, says: "The whole thing was done quick, quick, quick.

"If you look at the magnitude of the tender and the timeframe within which it was awarded, there have to be questions about the decision."

The tender to deliver this project has been awarded to the SMMT Online consortium, but it is not known which companies are involved in this group.

GautengOnline is a provincial initiative to build a province-wide school computer network to bridge the digital divide. The project will see 25-seat computer labs, with full Internet and e-mail capabilities, being created at all Gauteng schools, to be used for curriculum delivery.

According to the source, written submissions for the GautengOnline tender were dealt with in only 14 days. Since the project migrated from the provincial Department of Education to the Gauteng Shared Services Centre (GSSC), its budget ballooned by more than a billion rand.

"The manner in which it was executed is very worrying - there are basic administrative things that were not right," the source alleges.

The GautengOnline project was first announced in 2001 when it was allocated R500 million over the course of three years. This means the latest tender equates to a quadrupling of the initial budget for the project, since it was handed over to the GSSC.

The project aims to provide end-to-end computer laboratories to 2 000 schools. At the time of being handed over to the GSSC, about 1 000 schools in the province had computer laboratories, but not all of them were online yet.

Panyaza Lesufi, spokesman for the Gauteng Department of Education, would only confirm that a tender for GautengOnline was advertised last year and that the GSSC is handling the matter. He referred all additional queries to the GSSC.

Emmanuel Mdawu, spokesman for the GSSC, confirmed the allocation of the tender to SMMT Online, but was unable to immediately provide details about the consortium, tendering process, or scope of the project. He says the GSSC would have to look into the allegations that have been levelled with regard to the tender and would comment later.

Regular irregularities?

This is not the first time that allegations of improprieties surfaced at the GSSC. In 2005, former GSSC CEO Mike Roussos was linked to alleged fraudulent activities involving R4.6 million, with a company contracted by the GSSC.

He was also exposed as a major shareholder in another company, which was awarded a R52 million GSSC contract.

Gauteng MEC Paul Mashatile, under whose jurisdiction the GSSC falls, was also tainted by allegations of nepotism, after a big IT company hired his daughter at the time it was - ultimately successfully - tendering for a multimillion-rand tender with the GSSC.

In 2006, it came to light that the GSSC lost tens of millions of government funds through salary payments to "ghost" workers. Last year, the Democratic Alliance questioned whether a two-week systems failure at the GSSC due to a virus should rather be linked to corrupt activities at the shared services centre.